The only way that would work is if you owned a theater chain, but even then it would stop making money at some point. Unless steeply discounted, but then the profits go down. What I'm saying is you're not going to see a billion dollars that way.

Do re-releases count for box office ratings? If they do, then I could theoretically make an average, short movie and keep it in theaters for so long that it has to hit the billion dollar mark?

Yes, re-releases count. That's how ANH was able to top E.T. in 1997.

Believe it or not, I think the technical all-time box office champ is the porn classic "Deep Throat." It played in X-rated theaters for as long as 20 years. But nobody counts dirty movies along with mainstream Hollywood fare .

Do re-releases count for box office ratings? If they do, then I could theoretically make an average, short movie and keep it in theaters for so long that it has to hit the billion dollar mark?

Yes, re-releases count. That's how ANH was able to top E.T. in 1997.

Believe it or not, I think the technical all-time box office champ is the porn classic "Deep Throat." It played in X-rated theaters for as long as 20 years. But nobody counts dirty movies along with mainstream Hollywood fare .

--MissPadme

I thought it was Gone With the Wind. Hm. "Tickets sold" is the only real barometer, I think.

yes boxoffice doesnt mean much, but i like to see qualtiy films get their success. It just irritates me that lesser films such as the Harry Potter adaptations and trash like Transformers are outgrossing the likes of Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, etc.

Honestly i have no issue with Pirates of the Caribbean. They are fun adventure films like no other, due to their genre. I get enjoyment from them in the same vein of Indiana Jones, plus they are stunningly beautiful films, especially in blu ray.

I feel like when really good films are really high on the boxoffice, it means something. Like an achievement. It meant something that Star Wars, Gone with the Wind, E.T were so successful.

I even give credit to Titanic for its stunning sinking sequence, which was exhilarating. Avatar was a step forward in visuals for film making.

TPM had an easy hook with all new characters and an all-new Star Wars film. ROTS had an easy hook with Vader. But AOTC? Was it a love story or an urban sf adventure or a conspiracy tale or what?

The divided nature of AOTC (all the SW pictures are divided to some extent, I suppose) probably harmed its marketing a little, yes. And it clearly presents a challenge to some viewers; even some of its fans.

Now, had it been attached to a Twilight movie or something, it would have been gold. But this was years before Twilight and long before anyone realized there's a whole audience of young women/girls out there that had never been tapped.

This audience must have been known about by Lucas/Lucasfilm because of James Cameron's "Titanic", which you mentioned. The thing is that Star Wars, if it's anything, is more of a guy thing, in general, or had been, generally speaking, until AOTC, so it would have been difficult, on the face of it, to suddenly emphasize latent or emergent characteristics to an untapped demographic. Maybe the box office could have been upped slightly if some more specific marketing had been run. Who knows?

Anyhoo, as for the box office, the Star Wars movies never played on 15,000 screens and the prequels never benefitted from 3D or IMAX showings, save for a short re-release of AOTC in late '02, known as the Jimmy Smits-Free Version since they chopped 30 minutes out of the movie.

My understanding is that approximately twenty minutes were cut, not thirty. This was because -- again, if my understanding is correct -- the IMAX system used to allow for a maximum of two hours, and AOTC ran/runs some two hours and twenty minutes. From what I've read of the cuts, AOTC was essentially stripped of its heart, brain and soul. Funky ad poster, though.

Not so much it's heart, brain and soul as the sinews that held everything together in AOTC weren't there anymore. People just sort of....did things without much explanation. For example, the movie goes directly from Padme's ship blowing up to Obi-Wan and Anakin arriving at Padme's apartment; the in-between scene explaining exactly why and how Obi-Wan and Anakin were assigned to Padme was gone. Sure, you can imply that they were assigned to protect her because her ship got blown up, but you lose a big chunk of exposition about Dooku and the Seps with that scene, and Obi-Wan and Anakin's assignment changes from "deliberate manipulation by Palpatine" to "well, I guess they just sent whichever pair of Jedi that happened to be at the Temple that day."

I, for one, think that the prequels underperformed at the box office, particularly AOTC and ROTS. Even TPM had a good shot at beating Titanic, if it had more mass appeal and was even more standalone.
AOTc numbers can be explained by several factors:
1) Backlash from TPM
2) Relatively low key marketing
3) Less kids friendly than TPM but didn't have the meat of the story like ROTS
4) Strange editing decisions that hurt the flow of the story and the character development
5) Competition with Spiderman which came out at the right time (less than a year after 9/11, featuring New York as a primary setting).

ROTS did well, but could have done even better if the first two prequels weren't so divisive.

Well, let's be fair here. I thought AOTC could have been promoted better and might have performed better as a result, but overall, the prequels did very well especially in a decade crowded with popular franchises. ROTS outgrossed "Return of the King," "Spiderman 2," "Passion of the Christ," and a bunch of other blockbusters even though it was a tragic end to a popular series. Lucas didn't think it would be all of that successful because he wasn't sure if audiences could handle it. ROTS wiped the floor with the competition during a year when box office dropped overall. For most of its run, TPM made money faster than "Titanic." It was about as mass appeal as you're going to get but topping $600 million domestically was going to be a tall order in 1999 no matter what. If it hadn't been for "Titanic," TPM would have been the biggest box office hit of the 1990s and probably the all-time box office king internationally.

What changed between the OT era and the last decade is that Hollywood finally read the Spielberg/Lucas playbook on how to make a crowd pleaser, and it re-learned how to exploit popular pre-existing fare like books and comics for a huge built-in audience. Another thing that changed was piracy. I know people who saw the prequels once or twice in the theater and then downloaded pirated copies because they "were poor students" or "lived in a small town" far from some movie theater. People weren't going to see movies 20 times in the theater anymore for that reason. Back in the day, a pirated copy of TESB would have been shot under some guy's coat on poor quality video, sold on the streets for five bucks.

Well, let's be fair here. I thought AOTC could have been promoted better and might have performed better as a result, but overall, the prequels did very well especially in a decade crowded with popular franchises. ROTS outgrossed "Return of the King," "Spiderman 2," "Passion of the Christ," and a bunch of other blockbusters even though it was a tragic end to a popular series. Lucas didn't think it would be all of that successful because he wasn't sure if audiences could handle it. ROTS wiped the floor with the competition during a year when box office dropped overall. For most of its run, TPM made money faster than "Titanic." It was about as mass appeal as you're going to get but topping $600 million domestically was going to be a tall order in 1999 no matter what. If it hadn't been for "Titanic," TPM would have been the biggest box office hit of the 1990s and probably the all-time box office king internationally.

Yeah. How long was "Titanic" in theaters, and how long was TPM screened?

Titanic was in winter with virtually no competition (similar to Avatar, I think). TPM was in summer, with more blockbusters to compete with. It was worth for AOTC and ROTS. Ironically, it was Star Wars that started the summer blockbuster trend in the first place.

TPM didn't invent the midnight theaterical release, however it cannot be denied that TPM is the film responsible for the soaring popularity, and now even obligatory, midnight opening for mainstream blockbusters.

ESB played at midnight on a small scale, and prior (as well as after) that there was an old B-film / Cult culture movement centered around showing late night movies, but as far as midnight releases being a matter of mainstream marketing, and involving films that actually have the demand to pack the theater for that showing..... the credit must go to TPM.

"The Rocky Horror Picture Show" always played at midnight, or around 11:30 PM. It had been doing so for years, so that is one example of a late night film with longevity other than a SW film. With Star Wars, especially TPM, so many people wanted to be the first to see it that the theaters had to accomodate. Another way was to order two or three prints of the same movie to play on different screens in the same theater. Many theaters did this for TPM, but theaters had been doing that for years prior.

MissPadme said:

Believe it or not, I think the technical all-time box office champ is the porn classic "Deep Throat." It played in X-rated theaters for as long as 20 years. But nobody counts dirty movies along with mainstream Hollywood fare

I've never been to a porn theater before to watch a film, but I get the feeling there are not too many people sitting in the theaters to watch porn films. Even when I went to go see "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" (which is a bit weird) at a midnight showing, after it had played in the theaters for years, there were probably only ten people sitting in the theater to see it. I'm sure TPM 3D will be PACKED with people. Another $35 million for Lucas' bank.

^ early estimates based on partial friday numbers. Actual numbers likely to be higher if you ask me. Even back in 1999 the experts had this problem of constantly under predicting the strength of TPM playing to the family crowd during the day on Saturday afternoon and Sunday afternoon.

The only that I want is to see the movie go over unadjusted over a billion dollars. It is the one thing that has eluded George Lucas in his prequels. The rest, well, I could care less. Once this has been satisfied for me, I can finally put star wars to rest if thats what I decide to do. There are many movies that have gine over a billion dollars, and I always felt that star wars should be one of them. Can't say we won yet, since we don't even know what the total for the first weekend might be, or for that matter the international cume. With this movie, it is the international cume that I am looking for the most.

The only that I want is to see the movie go over unadjusted over a billion dollars. It is the one thing that has eluded George Lucas in his prequels. The rest, well, I could care less. Once this has been satisfied for me, I can finally put star wars to rest if thats what I decide to do. There are many movies that have gine over a billion dollars, and I always felt that star wars should be one of them. Can't say we won yet, since we don't even know what the total for the first weekend might be, or for that matter the international cume. With this movie, it is the international cume that I am looking for the most.

Well that's pretty much a lock since TPM will likely tally some $50 million domestically and will easily surpass that internationally.

Na-talie - you forgot the soccer world cup that also affected the box office. But, you were spot on with the rest. ROTS could have done more, but had to deal with the first two prequels lackluster reviews and the bashing. The bashing was just as bad and worse in many sectors than the reviews themselves.

Were not there yet, but its going to be great the day that Star Wars can reach the mile stone of a billion dollars unadjusted. Only 10 movies have been able to that in its entire run, and of course, no one can compare to Titanic and Avatar. They are on a league of their own, but the other 8 were very good movies. Hoping that star wars can finally enter that rank. The most sought out feat that has eluded the prequels.

So its opening weekend made $23m in the US and $43m worldwide. Good? Bad? Or average?

It looks to do better than Beauty and the Beast 3D but not as well as Lion King 3D.
Not bad certainly, not super great either.
To compare, ANH SE did 35 M$ in the 1997 re-release. And this without 3-D prizes and add to that 15 years of inflation.

It is likely to enter top 10 worldwide but that could be a short visit as the next Batman movie or maybe the Hobbit could push it out again.

Doubt it. Maybe $3-4 million more, but I just don't think there's quite the demand for Star Wars on the big screen as there was in 1997 (unless it was a new Star Wars film).

If you recall the trailer for the SEs showed Star Wars on this lttle TV playing through tinny little speakers as the narrator basically told you that the only way to see Star Wars was on your crappy little TV, but now you can see it on the big screen. Well that's just not the case today. People watch their DVDs or Blu-Ray discs on their 42" high def television and have it hooked up to their home surround system. That satisfies a LOT of consumer demand.

Additionally some people just don't like 3-D. They don't like having to wear the glasses and some people complain of headaches. Also, bear in mind the Lion King 3-D release also had a fairly sizable accompanying 2-D release as well. That's not quite the case with TPMs release.

So no, I don't think it would have ultimately mattered that much which film was released first.

There were a number of factors that hampered the box office of the prequels, especially AOTC and ROTS. TPM probably made about as much as it could have. It didn't break records opening weekend, mainly due to Lucas limiting it to quality cinemas, but its legs were phenomenal for a modern blockbuster. No film since with that level of hype has had such small drops from week to week.

AOTC suffered, as people have already said, from both the TPM backlash and its close proximity to Spider-Man. Lucasfilm wisely didn't want to overhype it, but it could have used a little extra marketing push against the wall crawler. It also didn't get an IMAX release until it had come out on DVD. If the IMAX release had come sooner, it probably would have added another $20 million at least to the box office.

ROTS suffered because 2005 was a down year for the box office, and it didn't get an IMAX release (which would have pushed it over $400 million easily). It also didn't get a significant dollar theatre run, something I've never understood. TPM and even AOTC carried on playing until the following year, but ROTS was gone from cinemas by the time the DVD came out. It would have had much better legs if Lucasfilm and Fox had given it some kind of push later in its run.

As for the worldwide box office, Star Wars has just never been as popular outside America (except in a few countries like the UK and Japan). Though if the prequels had been in 3D they might have got closer to a billion worldwide, if not more. TPM and ROTS still could

I fail to see how box office gross is relevant to anything, especially considering movie ticket prices have just about doubled over the past 20 years (at least where I live anyway). Twenty years ago, I could see a new release on "half price Tuesday" for $3.75 after tax. Nowadays, half price Tuesday doesn't exist, and the regular price for a new release is around $14 after tax. Then of course there's 3D releases, which charge an extra couple bucks on top of general admission price.

What would be really interesting to see is an actual figure of number of tickets sold. Then we could REALLY see which films are champs.